


led by your beating heart

by mosaicofhearts



Category: The Maze Runner (Movies), The Maze Runner Series - All Media Types, The Maze Runner Series - James Dashner
Genre: Angst, Can be read as gen, Canon-Typical Violence, Gen, Gen or Pre-Slash, Happy Ending, Lots of Angst, M/M, Maybe - Freeform, Newt Feels, ambiguous ending, crank!newt, introspective, mainly
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-25
Updated: 2018-08-25
Packaged: 2019-07-02 10:25:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,696
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15794628
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mosaicofhearts/pseuds/mosaicofhearts
Summary: There's still a rational part of him, dwindling by the day. A part that knows that this is the beginning of lunacy. This is the last shred of sanity disentangling itself from a brain that feels half Gone already. His undoing is almost upon him.





	led by your beating heart

**Author's Note:**

> ya gals at it again with the introspective newt angst!!
> 
> i'm in the middle of writing a more fluffy au but then this happened so... sorry, i guess.
> 
> not beta'd! any mistakes are my own! feedback always welcome, i appreciate it sooo much!

Immunity is a gift from the gods, and he can see it illuminating his friends from the inside out; like a brand, white hot and impossible to forget.

Or perhaps that's the bitterness talking.

He can never seem to tell these days, the difference between _him_ and _it_.

Thomas shines brightest of all, and sometimes Newt can barely stand to look at him. His eyes burn with the effort of it, and when he shuts them down against the pain, Thomas' silhouette is there singeing the back of his eyelids.

There's still a rational part of him, dwindling by the day. A part that knows that this is the beginning of lunacy. This is the last shred of sanity disentangling itself from a brain that feels half _Gone_ already. His undoing is almost upon him.

Yet he wouldn't trade this with any of them, given half a chance. Not Minho, not Frypan – hell, not even Teresa, whose sharp eyes are as distrusting as he. Better him than them.

(After all... is this not what he wanted?)

\- - - - -

Immunity is a gift from the gods that he was not blessed with, yet he thanks them each morning with unsteady hands and eyes that glisten.

He still believes after all this time, after the hell they've been through, that there's somewhere out there for them. There is a place that is lush with greenery; where the sun does not rage and the Flare is nothing but a horror story from distant mouths, where there is a past to forget and a future to behold.

But _them_ does not mean _us_. Most of the time, he's okay with that. He made his peace with the devil long ago, back when their destiny had been foretold to them, when everything had fallen into place.

He remembers the weight of Thomas' gaze against his profile. He remembers the quiet calm that had settled into his very soul; not the panic that had overcome others around him as they too were told that they were not immune. That the Flare was already there inside them, rooted too deeply now to purge – any hope for a cure lessening by the second.

The Glue was just another variable, and nothing more than that.

The Glue can only hold on for so long before the heat becomes too much and the bonds begin to disintegrate.

\- - - - -

The Flare doesn't scare him in the ways it should.

It's the Changing that really does it.

Hatred embeds itself down into his stomach like a bad seed. It chokes him as he bites back words he doesn't want to let spill, teeth tearing through his lower lip, and he doesn't realise it until the metallic acidity of his own blood sparks up his tongue.

This part of him should be kept for WCKD and WCKD only, but his long-forged control is slipping further and further away.

Anger sets him on fire and he blazes for what feels like an eternity.

It's the look on Tommy's face that brings him crashing back into himself, because of course it is – the dismay, the sorrow, all tinged with something that Newt has to tear his own gaze from, a sharp, empty pain that penetrates and has him gasping for air –

Recognition.

This is no time for denial; perhaps time for relief. Tommy _knows_. There's no hiding this. Raised voices and clenched fists are not the Newt anyone knows; the boy of the Glade who was calm tones and _think first, act later_.

He's becoming something he doesn't even know himself, and it's the fear in the eyes of others that sets the terror into play.

\- - - - -

Tommy stares at him when he thinks Newt's not looking, and it splinters his heart right there across its' centre.

He never wanted to become just another burden for the other to bare. Christ knows, he has enough of those as it is. But the unpleasant truth is there out in the open, and Newt _gets_ it, he does. Because if this was the other way around, Newt doubts he could live with the pain of seeing Thomas hurtle down into madness; into a shell of the boy he once was.

He meets Thomas' forlorn gaze, and the smile is there but it doesn't quite manage to reach his eyes.

Newt knows that feeling well enough.

“Just hold on,” Thomas says, as though that's the easiest thing in the world, and Newt wants to bark out a laugh, a horrible high-pitched, ugly little thing, but he jams his mouth and keeps quiet. “There's a cure, Newt. I know there's a cure.”

Empty promises never did sound so sweet, with Thomas' hand curling protectively around his bicep, too-hot and not enough all at the same time.

\- - - - -

Perhaps it's selfish, but he thinks he's earned a little selfish at this stage of his life.

He's dying.

He can feel himself rotting from the inside, the scent of death following him, remarkably cloying in its' nature. He's not the only one that senses it.

He wants to go on his own terms, and is that too much to ask? That he doesn't die with his mind completely lost and his tendencies violent and bloodthirsty. Dreams of the _Gone_ have him waking to heaving breaths that wrack his entire, too-small form, heart pulsing against his chest in a manner that screams _I'm alive! I'm alive, I'm alive!_ – but for how long? And to what end?

He sees fear mixed with pity swirling in the liquid gazes of those closest to him, and he doesn't know how to deal with that. Death – death is just another stepping stone in life. Death is something he's accepted; something he once would have welcomed with open arms.

And perhaps those days are long gone, but there's still that part of him that collapses in solace at the thought that the end is near. He doesn't let that show – can't hurt his friends, his brothers, more than he knows he already is, even if this time it isn't quite his fault.

But the point is... the point is, it isn't death that forces him awake at night, body shining with a cold sweat and head pounding, fit to burst. It isn't death that has him heaving and choking back sobs that could give too much away.

He wakes from dreams in which he is the villain, standing tall and manic amongst the broken bodies of his comrades, pale skin tarnished with evidence of brutality.

\- - - - -

“Just hold on.”

It becomes a mantra from Thomas' lips, whispered day in, day out, a grim determination etched across a face too weary for his age, and all Newt can do is nod and smile and pretend that the black of his veins isn't creeping further into his bloodstream as each day passes.

He knows what it's like to need a prayer like that. He whispers each name like a prayer at night, begs for the safe refuge of his friends. It helps, mostly. It reminds him that he's not lost to the darkness yet, that there's still something real and warm and human within him, that he's still _fighting_.

But the war can only wage for so long and he's too smart to believe that he will be the victor this time around.

\- - - - -

They find Minho.

They find Minho, and Newt wants to sob and sob and sob, but he doesn't. There's no time for anything other than a quick huddle of warmth and support and happiness that shines through despite everything, and it's over too soon. The world is falling apart around them once more, and they have to go, just as they always do.

It's then that he realises – this is why he's held on for so long. For this. For Minho; to ensure that his best friend, one of the last few gladers remaining, is safe and sound. To ensure that Thomas doesn't have to go through the future alone.

Because he knows.

This is it.

The end of the road. And christ, has it been some road. He can't smile, not really, because the suffering has begun and it's nigh on too much to bear. He feels it encroaching into his mind and soul and body and he grits his teeth against the pain to the point that it hurts, another thing to focus on instead of the fact that he's finally losing.

All he can say to Minho is _thank you_ and it's not nearly enough to convey what he feels for the other, but there's a knowing that settles into Minho's eyes even as he repeats Thomas' mantra and runs faster than his tortured body should allow, and – well, that's Minho, isn't it. That's all of them, and that's how much they mean to one another.

Then it's him and it's Thomas, and there's nothing he can say to the other that's not been written down and shoved into his hand to discover at a later time, when he's rebuilding the future for everyone who has survived this far.

He's fading before he knows it, something monstrous taking over. There's an uncomfortable, insistent buzzing in his head that seems to be coming from _inside_ his brain and he can't force it down any longer.

He sees Tommy's face on the edge of it all and suddenly all he can think is _kill_.

He doesn't know much about what happens next.

There are moments, becoming faster and more scarce, where he comes back into himself.

One – his hands fall from where they're wrapped vice-like around his best friends throat.

Two – he rolls off the others body quick as a shot, gasping for breath.

Three – he has a gun and he doesn't know which one of them he's trying to use it against.

Four – there's a dull pain in his chest and Thomas' face is too close to his. Wet silver tracks it's way down both of their faces, and it's – it's a human sensation. He hears voices screaming, can decipher Minho and Brenda amongst the havoc, and then he's falling, falling, falling –

His last thought is _thank you_.

\- - - - -

He wakes to the sound of the ocean.

**Author's Note:**

> i realise i haven't been replying to comments, but i never know what to say other than i love and appreciate you so much! like, i always leave it too late and then i'm like.... i can't reply 3 weeks late, right!? anyways, i'm gonna be making a conscious effort to reply now b/c you guys need to know how happy u make me!
> 
> find me on tumblr @ newtsisms ! giffing and stuff.


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